


ships in the night

by mondfleck



Category: EVERGLOW (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:15:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25981951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mondfleck/pseuds/mondfleck
Summary: She wonders if Yoorim will wake up tomorrow and watch the sunrise from her dorm on the SNU campus and think of her. If she’ll think about how the sky caught on flames, burned away the remaining sliver of time left they had with one another.
Relationships: Heo Yoorim | Aisha/Wang Yiren
Comments: 3
Kudos: 23





	ships in the night

**Author's Note:**

> hey yo!!!!!
> 
> this is completely and utterly unedited. i was just being sadpphic and whipped this up real quick. this was originally supposed to be part of a larger wip, but i quit (for now.)
> 
> hello to my first everglow fic/drabble ever woo!
> 
> title from “sweet night” by v of bts

“Is this my shirt or yours?” Yoorim asks quietly, holding up a lavender cropped cardigan, something that looks vaguely familiar and Yiren’s style.

Yiren rubs her eyes and rolls over to check her phone. 5:01 AM, it reads. Sunday, August 16. A tiny Calendar app notification displays _yoorimie home today!_ and her heart sinks like the dense thing it is. Yoorim’s going home today and she’s going to sleep in her own, familiar bed, wake up and notice the absence of Yiren next to her.

It still feels like they have months left together, years to spend, but their time comes to a quiet close, a diminuendo into silence. Yoorim was only supposed to be here for ten months and Yiren was supposed to be a helpful exchange student liaison. It was only supposed to be one of the university’s joint cultural exchange programs. Friendship was encouraged, of course, but there was never anything written in about getting closer than that.

“Mine,” she replies, setting her phone back down on the nightstand and falling back onto the pillows. “Why are you up so early?”

Yoorim offers a small smile. “Packing.”

“Early flight?”

“Kinda. Wanted to catch the sunrise before I leave.” She folds a T-shirt and drops it into her suitcase with a sigh. “You can go back to sleep if you’d like.”

Yiren shakes her head. “I’ll watch the sunrise with you. When is it?”

They end up dragging a chair out onto the balcony just as a glimmer of sun materializes on the horizon. The morning air is chilly, much colder than Yiren had ever remembered Shanghai to be in the dead of August. Even when Yoorim wraps her arms around her waist, shifting underneath her, the coolth is unusual.

“A new day begins,” Yoorim murmurs.

The sun rises higher and higher, ascending into the sky. It is a deep red in the darkness of the sky before it glows bright white, golden around the edges like a pearl with a gold bezel.

She wonders if Yoorim will wake up tomorrow and watch the sunrise from her dorm on the SNU campus and think of her. If she’ll think about how the sky caught on flames, burned away the remaining sliver of time left they had with one another.

Yiren turns around and watches the sun cast a shadow onto Yoorim’s face with Yiren’s silhouette, chiaroscuro. She’s squinting a bit to keep the sunlight from hurting her eyes as the rest of her face sparkles in the golden hour luminescence. Irony tugs at Yiren’s lips. After taking Yoorim sightseeing across what is deemed to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world, nothing comes close to how beautiful Yoorim is, barefaced in the light of the rising sun, inches away from Yiren. A sight unlike any other, a sight for her eyes only.

“What are you looking at,” she asks bashfully.

“You,” Yiren replies, and Yoorim hides her face in her hands.

“Don’t. I’m not wearing makeup!”

Yiren laughs breathlessly. “You don’t need to.”

Warm. So warm as they bask in the heat of a new day. Warm as Yiren curls up in Yoorim’s lap and tucks her head into the crook of her neck. Warm as her heart beats steadily.

Yoorim turns her head. “Kiss me?”

It’s chaste and leaves much more to be desired, but it will have to suffice for now. As long as Yiren can remember the way Yoorim smiled against her lips, everything will be a little more bearable.

But she doesn’t want just bearable, she wants more. She wants to hold hands in Shanghai, kiss her in Seoul, hold her in Beijing, share an umbrella with her in Busan. She wants more than skin on skin or lips on lips for the fun of it.

Yiren sighs into her mouth once more, ignoring the way her heart lurches when her silhouette disappears from Yoorim’s body.

“Yoorim,” she whispers, only to be shushed.

“I know I haven’t been the best at learning Mandarin while studying abroad, and you’ve been trying to teach me,” Yoorim says sheepishly, “so I decided I’d study a bit before I leave.”

“Oh? That’s the first time I’ve heard of you studying,” Yiren jokes. She tucks a lock of hair behind Yoorim’s ear, tender and careful. The girl blushes and whines a _shut up!_

She clears her throat. “ _I…like you, Yiren,_ ” she mumbles in Mandarin, tripping a little over the tones. “ _You have been…nothing…but kind to me._ ”

“That’s sweet,” Yiren tells her earnestly.

“ _I didn’t finish!_ ” Yoorim interjects, pouting. It makes Yiren giggle. “Yah, don’t laugh at me! I’m trying my best. Gosh, Yirennie. Be nice!”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she laughs. “Keep going, you’re doing great.”

“ _Thank you,_ ” Yoorim intones in perfect pronunciation. “ _Even though…we haven’t known each other for that long…I think…I mean, I feel as though we’ve known each other for a lifetime._ ”

Although the pronunciation isn’t perfect, syllables slightly jumbled in the middle, it takes Yiren’s breath away. She can’t feel her lungs dilate and expand to breathe in air. Her lungs are full of Yoorim, her floral perfume, the Chinese jasmine-scented zanthoxyli radix toothpaste that she took a liking to when Yiren took her to the drug store around the corner, the way she always smells like home.

The words sit heavy in her heart. She can’t breathe and she wants to cry.

“ _I’ll always treasure the time we spent together. Doesn’t matter where I am in the world. There will always be a piece of you in my heart._ ”

Yiren is too afraid to blink. Whether it is because her welled-up tears will fall or Yoorim will disappear when she reopens her eyes.

“Yoorim,” she says thickly, but she is interrupted with a quick peck.

“I practiced really hard, Yiren, let me finish,” she smiles. Yiren concedes, nodding and patting her cheek to signal _go ahead._

“ _Just because I’m leaving now doesn’t mean I won’t come back one day,_ ” she continues, interlacing their fingers together. “ _I’ll come back again, or maybe you’ll come to me. I’ll wait for you if you’ll still have me then._ ”

“I do want you. I want you so much.”

“ _I do too. I…I didn’t think I’d find someone like you along the way. I thought, maybe I’ll meet a girl at some party and spend a night, and never see her again. But instead—_ ” she inhales, unsteady, “ _—I met you. I made a best friend. I met my soulmate._ ”

Yiren’s heart seems to shrivel in her chest. Like someone reached into her chest, squeezed it, and tore it apart.

“ _These next words are some of the easiest and probably the first words I learned, but…I love you. And I mean that from the bottom of my heart._ ”

Yoorim bites her lip and looks away as Yiren blinks once, twice, and hot tears fall.

“Hey, no, no. Don’t cry, Yirennie, you’re gonna make me cry too,” Yoorim says wetly, sniffling and roughly wiping her eyes. “Yah, Wang Yiren! You know I’m the crybaby out the two of us.”

Yiren cries and she laughs. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

“Well stop it!”

“I love you too, Heo Yoorim,” she murmurs, cracking a smile that cracks her chest open and leaves it to bleed openly. Bleed with the shattered pieces of her heart, with the overwhelming love she has for this girl.

Yoorim leans in first. They share a salty kiss, tears staining faces, and lips. It’s not enough to overpower the bittersweetness of this farewell. This is the last kiss they’ll share for a while.

“One day, we’ll meet again, okay? We’ll keep in touch,” Yoorim hiccups. “We’re gonna stay friends.”

“Friends,” Yiren echoes. She swallows. “Yeah. We will.”

Yoorim kisses her forehead and lets her lips linger a little longer before she gets up and backs away.

“You wanna help me finish packing?” she asks quietly.

The sun is up now, the last few embers of twilight dying down. It’s warm again, not quite hot yet, slightly humid. She doesn’t want to move from the balcony right now. Yiren gazes up at Yoorim, who stares at her affectionately.

“Stay? Just a little longer?”

Yoorim clutches Yiren’s hand tightly. “Okay.”

Just a little.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!  
> [twt](https://twitter.com/miayiren)


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